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Veteran Health Care

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As the largest integrated health care provider in the United States, the Department of Veterans Affairs faces significant challenges in ensuring access to high quality health care for military veterans. RAND has a wealth of expertise in health policy research, which informs its analyses related to the medical care needs of military veterans and their families, as well as the care systems intended to meet them.

A unique partnership to support private efforts to provide mental health services to veterans and their families could be a model for similar efforts should federal officials decide to expand privately provided health care as part of reform of the VA health system.

Most community-based mental health providers are not well prepared to take care of the special needs of military veterans and their families. A national survey found that few providers met criteria for military cultural competency or used evidence-based approaches to treat problems commonly seen among veterans.

Given the VA's desire to promote evidence-based practice, this evidence mapping project will help provide guidance to VA leadership about the distribution of evidence to inform policy and clinical decision making.

This paper presents a study protocol to evaluate the implementation of an evidence-based, co-occurring disorder treatment called Maintaining Independence and Sobriety Through Systems Integration, Outreach, and Networking--Veterans Edition (MISSION-Vet) in HUD-VASH using an implementation strategy called Getting To Outcomes (GTO).

Faith-based organizations are an important resource for veterans as they readjust to civilian life. Interviews reveal how they address diverse areas of veteran health and well-being, and suggest ways to better integrate them into the web of support.

Veterans and their families face many barriers to mental health care. Partnerships between a public agency, such as the VA, and a private organization, such as a private hospital, have been discussed as a potential solution. What are the key components for successful public-private partnerships?

Thanks to a growing list of more than 100 organizations that have pledged their commitment as members of the Elizabeth Dole Foundation's National Coalition for Military Caregivers, our nation is taking long overdue action to support both our wounded warriors and those who care for them.

Suicide prevention efforts are crucial, but having procedures in place to respond is also important. The DoD has no policies on what to do after a suicide to prevent subsequent ones, although there are resources available to help those bereaved and processes to honor the service member and his or her family.

In the context of rising rates of suicide among U.S. military personnel, this report reviews the literature on gatekeeper models of suicide prevention to better understand what is known about the effectiveness of gatekeepers and gatekeeper training.

Honoring and serving our current and former members of the armed forces, particularly through periods of illness or when recovering from injuries, requires that we attend to their family members and friends who provide the care that is critical to keeping them alive and thriving.

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Paul G. Shekelle is a staff physician at the West Los Angeles Veterans Affairs Medical Center and has served as director of the Southern California Evidence-based Practice Center for the RAND Corporation since 1997. He is also a professor of medicine at the University of California, Los Angeles…

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